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On Sunday, May 27th, the fourth day of the 38th Chicago Open Backgammon Tournament, Giants #1 Masayuki “Mochy” Mochizuki and Giants #2 Michihito “Michy” Kageyama presented the newest version of our “Backgammon Proficiency Test”. They also offered a comprehensive review to its participants on the following day.

Our proficiency test has attracted more and more attention from players all over the world since its establishment in May 2011. We are proud to announce that the total number of the participants has just reached 1000. Thank you everyone!

In Chicago, that was the fifth consecutive time this year. The previous articles are here:

The number of participants of this year was 40, the highest number ever, and the questionnaire said that there were 24 players with over 10 years’ experience. It has become a kind of popular event there.

As the result, an anonymous player is on top with 41 correct answers (out of 50), followed by Frank Talbot and Gerry Tansey. Provisionally, (Anonymous) is now ranked first overall. You can see the list of overall results as of now here.

The 7th round of our 7th “Backgammon Proficiency Test” was held as “BGTV Proficiency Contest” on Saturday, January 13th, the middle day of the Istanbul Open 2018.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t join it, but the test was supervised by our Turkish friends, Arda Fındıkoğlu (the host of the Istanbul Open and the president of WBF Turkey) and Cüneyt Argun Genç. They carried that out smoothly and all went well. They always cooperate with us, so we are really grateful to them.

Well, that was the sixth consecutive time our test was carried out there.
This year, 19 participants with various levels from various countries challenged it.

The result says that Jalil Khalili (Iran) answered 30 problems correctly (out of 50) and was ranked first among them, although he was ranked second last year. Claus Elken (Denmark) got second place at the contest, and then he got second place at the main championship. Martin Barkwill (UK) was ranked third, although he got the highest last year. Onur Vurur got the top score among the Turks this year.

Here are the details of this round.

Rank

Total score

Total errors

Name

1

30

2300

Jalil Khalili

2

28

2245

Claus Elken

3

27

2520

Martin Barkwill

3

27

3252

Onur Vurur

5

24

3662

Abdullah Sorgüven

6

22

4010

Burhan Cumhur Bektüre

7

20

3432

Tuğrul Sezgin

7

20

3510

O. P.

9

19

4479

Fady Asmar

9

19

4521

Fuat Hakan Uncuoğlu

11

17

4336

Hakan Aksu

11

17

4530

Cynthia Roberts

11

17

4609

Mustafa Dikgöz

11

17

5269

Alparslan Göktay

15

16

5459

Göksel Kılınç

16

15

4254

Refik Vural

17

14

4196

Ender Can Avcioğlu

18

13

4713

T. B.

19

12

4715

Kemal Aksu

Total 19

Ave. 19.7

Ave. 4001

It was unfortunate that I couldn’t go there this year, but I am happy that many people joined it.

Akihito

(Updated Saturday, January 27th)
Arda Fındıkoğlu, Cüneyt Argun Genç and Gökhan Güneş have challenged the same test after the Istanbul Open 2018. They said that they strictly monitored each other to play fair, so we decided to list up their scores on our official results just as before.

Arda’s score was so good as in the past, while Cüneyt and Gökhan didn’t do better than last year.

We really appreciate their cooperation during “BGTV Proficiency Contest”.
Thank you again!

This was the first time our test was held in California, and we are grateful to have been given this opportunity.

There were 23 entries for the test. While it might be the first time for many of the participants to take it, Bob Wachtel, who is also Giants #12, got the top score with 39 points (out of 50). Based on the number of correct answers, he currently ranks third among them all. You can see the overall results of the 7th test as of now here.

A total of 35 players were present at the exam, and the number was larger than last year.
In addition to Falafel (USA, Giants #4), the defending champion of the 6th exam, the world’s leading players such as Jorgen Granstedt (Sweden, the first 3-time World Champion), Steen Gronbech (Denmark, Giants #14), Zdenek Zizka (Czech, who got the highest score in the 5th exam) went in for it.

What a surprise! Marc Olsen (Sweden, Giants #40) marked an incredibly high score of 44/50. Steen Gronbech and Falafel also did remarkably well, but their scores were 6 points behind Marc Olsen’s. Zdenek Zizka was ranked 4th with 37/50, and Jorgen Granstedt followed.

Currently, Marc Olsen stands in first place in terms of both the number of right answers and the total error rate (equity loss) among all of the attendees. You can see the overall results of the 7th exam as of now here.

This is the fourth consecutive year that it has been held, and it is becoming increasingly popular especially among intermediate and advanced-level players. Over fifty player (including Falafel, Jorgen Granstedt, Steen Gronbech, etc) have already challenged it so far.